You're In Good Hands

Forever clear and free, the Chicago lakefront was decreed by law to be open land, green space for the citizen whose wretched hovel provided little air and sun. Unless, of course, some politically connected types want to put up a museum.

Thanks to corruption and insider deals and graft, it costs a great deal to run Chicago. The taxpayers are turnip-like in their inability to provide money when squeezed, so who is going to foot the bill?

Put those two situations together and you've got yourself a museum where none is supposed to be, and thank you Allstate for donating $15 million to the boondoggle. In gratitude, the new pile will be labeled the Chicago Children's Museum at Allstate Place.

There's been an uproar among those who would like to see the lakefront kept as park land, and they're not buying into the claim that the museum's to be largely underground. The building's architects must think that children are little moles, or they subscribe to the old adage that children should be neither seen nor heard.

The Park District has rubber-stamped the plan, in spite of repeated protests. A lot of talk and outrage at public meetings proves that those opposed have missed the point. They could easily stop the disaster from landing on the grassy field along the lake. All they have to do is come up with $20 million to counter Allstate's offer.

This is Chicago. It's all about the bribe and the pay-off.